At the end of our third date we ended up at her apartment. We’d been fooling around and took our clothes off. At one point she reached into this little yellow box full of poppers (amyl nitrate), broke open the capsule, and held it under my nose, and all of a sudden I went limp. It was clear I wasn’t going to be getting it on that night. The poppers freaked me out. She freaked me out. I was clueless—I didn’t know what they were for or how I was expected to react to them. The experience left my confidence so shaken that the next time we went out, I didn’t even try to get her in bed. I was frightened by her intellectual brilliance, assertiveness, and sexual superiority, and so we drifted apart.
I had dated a lot, but, sexually speaking, I was a novice compared to Susan, and that one experience of failing to perform worried me and led me into therapy for the first time in my life. For four or five months I saw a Freudian shrink who, as you may or may not know, said almost nothing. You could sit or lie there in silence for fifty minutes if you, the patient, chose to say nothing. But you paid for it. I chose to open up and share some of my innermost thoughts and fears about growing up and my relationship with my father and mother. Then the good doctor explained he was leaving on vacation for the entire month of August. I was not ready to put my therapy on hold. I was intrigued by an experimental psychologist I had heard about who believed in using psychedelic drugs as part of his therapeutic process. We talked for hours about life and how LSD affects awareness, consciousness, and the mysterious workings of the subconscious. He explained that LSD turns off the regions of the brain that constrain consciousness, allowing for an increase in the flow of free thought. Your imagination shifts into high gear and takes you to places that can be terrifying or exhilarating. LSD can give you a feeling of enlightenment about yourself and the world you live in.
After about three months of LSD therapy with him, he referred me to a spiritual psychologist, a practicing Buddhist. He taught me a style of meditation with breathing techniques that helped to diminish mental anguish and tension. This would prove to be a useful tool in my life. All of this took place over the course of almost a year, giving me a greater understanding of and insight into myself. The experience cracked open a window on a newfound curiosity for truth and enlightenment.
Then, one evening, as luck would have it, I bumped into Susan at a party and the spark was immediately reignited within me. She was the kind of girl I wanted at my side and in my life. In our excitement we planned a long getaway weekend together in the Caribbean. Part of me was looking forward to going away with her; the other part was terrified. The idea of what might happen once the two of us were alone in a bedroom for days scared me, even after my months of therapy. But, as scheduled, we traveled to the Dutch island of Bonaire. We stayed in a small, two-story hotel, which offered nothing but dark, damp rooms, and it felt like anything but a sexy island getaway. That didn’t deter Susan—she would’ve been hot to trot in a mortuary. I thought if I drank enough rum I’d get over my fears and rise to the occasion. But each night that I didn’t, Susan became more and more fixated on me, using every trick in her repertoire. And the more fixated she became, the more frightened I became. By our last day in Bonaire, she was hysterical.
“I can’t stand it!” she cried. “I can’t stand being with someone who can’t make love with me! What’s the matter with you?”
I wondered the same thing.
I was beside myself. Here I was with this beautiful, successful, smart woman—whom I was really attracted to—and I couldn’t make love to her. She was right—there must be something wrong with me. I didn’t know what to say; it made no sense to me either. What the hell was it that was preventing me from getting aroused? In those days we didn’t discuss erectile dysfunction. TV commercials depicting an amorous couple in a seaside bathtub enjoying four hours of erection thanks to the wonder pill, Viagra, were unheard of. In 1968, I was convinced it was just me.
Finally, Susan and I left Bonaire and flew through Aruba on our way back to the US, though this time we went out of our way to book a night at a really nice hotel, giving us one last shot at paradise before heading back home. Our hotel could not have been more different than the one in Bonaire. It was a beautiful white modern high-rise hotel with bright, cheerful rooms opening onto beautiful terraces with comfortable chaise lounges, all of which overlooked the glistening blue ocean, dotted with little white sailboats. It was uplifting, to say the least, and it shifted my mood immediately. I started to relax.
Lounging around, sipping an Island rum drink, I watched Susan prance around our room in nothing but a pair of panties. Life felt good again. We decided to sit outside on the terrace, and after a while she leaned over and gently kissed me. Her hysteria was gone. She was calm, loving; it was wonderful. And then it happened. I started to feel the rush of sexual excitement.
We slowly and gently touched each other in a loving way and suddenly I was fully aroused. I immediately started to worry and I could feel my body tensing, and then something new happened and I snapped to it, just as I had practiced in exercises with my Eastern shrink. I changed my breathing. I could feel my heart rate slow and I began to relax. Just like that, I was back in business.
Susan didn’t pressure me. We just let it go to wherever it was going to go, and before I could think of anything that might stop it from happening, we both climaxed. We smiled with satisfaction and I kissed her passionately. I woke up the next morning happy to be cuddled up behind her and very aroused. I kissed her tenderly and after much foreplay we made love to each other like never before. I broke through my mental barrier and from that moment on I couldn’t get enough of Susan.
Susan became my first long-term girlfriend. We enjoyed evenings together down in The Village, eating steaks at Nick’s while listening to live Dixieland music. Other evenings we went to Little Italy to eat at my favorite restaurant there: Paolucci’s. Some nights we’d go to Bianchi and Margherita where the waiters sang opera and the chef would burst out of the kitchen to join in the “Anvil Chorus” from Il Trovatore. I’ve always loved opera, so I’d sing along in Italian, which always impressed Susan. There was always great dance music at Shepheard’s in The Drake Hotel on Fifty-Sixth Street and Park Avenue, one of the early discotheques in New York City. You never knew who might be hanging around in the wee hours since the hotel was home to Hendrix, The Stones, and others when they were on tour in America. I drank Dewar’s on the rocks. She drank white wine. We were drunk on each other.
We sort of lived together, going back and forth between her apartment and mine; we traveled to Spain and France and skied in Aspen and Europe. I was crazy about her, the sex was amazing, and we were well-suited for each other in so many ways. Eventually, though, I was forced to face reality and the fact that Susan wanted to marry, settle down, and have children sooner rather than later. I wasn’t ready for that. I was thinking only about how much fun we were having. It was painful, but finally, Susan and I mutually decided to call it quits.
I was in the middle of it all: New York City in the 1960s, a time of cultural, political, and social upheaval that changed America’s mindset. America had been through tumultuous times before, but nothing like the 1960s when, for the first time ever, an entire generation of America’s young people rejected their parents’ values and beliefs, “the establishment,” and formed a generation gap the likes of which the country had never experienced before. We questioned the political system, the economy, social standards, and sexual mores. It started on the college campuses but became a cause for many Americans. We supported the civil rights movement, opposed the Vietnam War, and then fell head over heels in love with sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Marijuana and LSD were the most popular drugs of the day, and we dismissed anyone who doubted that pot was as harmless as beer or that psychedelics were mind expanding. The 1960s were a time to make love not war, and I reflected my generation’s views. I worked diligently to raise money for presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy and lat
er for George McGovern. I preferred sleeping around to marrying and starting a family, and I used both marijuana and LSD to better my life. The mindset of the day was “if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with”—a smash hit by Stephen Stills.
The sexual revolution took hold and suddenly, everywhere I went, there were long-legged, miniskirted girls who wanted to have sex with me. I soon discovered that as a successful entrepreneur I never came across a shortage of women, especially after being named Cosmopolitan’s Bachelor of the Month. I was twenty-eight years old and excited about the unknown. As I ventured out into the social world of the late 1960s with a newfound confidence in my sexuality, I chose to pay attention and continue to learn from women, wanting to enhance their pleasure and my experiences with them. Some men were too busy enjoying themselves to have a clue as to what women wanted or needed sexually, but that was not entirely their fault. A lot of girls never said anything, either because they didn’t know and were afraid to ask, or they were trying to come off as innocent. The problem with that scenario is that quite often the guy hits his climax, rolls over, and falls asleep, and the girl is left lying there wondering, “Is that all there is?” She never experiences that “fire down below” passion. I was determined to be a considerate lover, mainly because I derived so much more pleasure from the experience of knowing whoever I was with was satisfied. Now that my impotency issue had been resolved once I discovered that some women just didn’t turn me on, I no longer questioned my masculinity but understood it was just the chemistry of the moment. I was fearless and ready for the 1970s.
In the 1960s and ’70s, I dated a lot, frequenting some of the hottest, most elegant discotheques of the time. If it was a Sunday night I’d head over to Doubles in The Sherry Netherland Hotel, a chic members-only hangout for Jackie Kennedy. Sandy Stack, a pretty little blonde DJ from London, always blew me away with her selection of The Stones and R&B tracks. Sandy’s son, DJ Patrick Oliver, travels the world playing some of the best Electronic Dance Music I have ever heard
Arthur opened in 1965, created by Richard Burton’s first wife Sybil, after he dumped her for Elizabeth Taylor. It was the precursor to Studio 54—a hangout for Andy Warhol, Truman Capote, Rudolf Nureyev, Roger Daltrey, and Wilt Chamberlain. It was obvious how important Sybil thought it was to jam-pack the club with young and beautiful girls. She turned Manhattan upside down with her admission policy—it was no longer about who you were but how hot you looked. Terry Noel was the DJ and the music he played was seamless and brilliant. The band ended each set with a cover song and Terry would take over—blending in the original on vinyl.
L’Interdit in the Gotham Hotel was another spot that I really enjoyed. It was decorated in red velvet, intimately lit, and the DJ played a great selection of sexy French dance music. The chicest of all was Le Club, a Kennedy family hangout. Le Club was my favorite, the first European-style discotheque in New York City. The DJ, Slim Hyatt, dictated the mood, set the pace, got the people up and dancing, and was a master at picking the right music to please the sophisticated, worldy crowd. I started spending time there once my former Forest Hills partner Philippe, known as Philippe of the Waldorf, sponsored me for membership. The crowd was beautiful, wealthy, and international with members such as Gianni Agnelli, Aristotle Onassis, and Hollywood’s Ray Stark, dancing the night away with some of the wealthiest, most beautiful, and most intriguing women in the world.
These new discotheques in New York City were fashioned after the famous Parisian nightclub Castel, where I loved to dance when I was studying abroad in 1960, and again as a naval officer when I managed to get free flights to France. Discotheques in Europe were all the rage, and I spent a lot of time in them. In lieu of bands, they played records, whereas American nightclubs mostly featured live music. Throughout the night, the bands would play a forty-five-minute set, then take a thirty-minute break, leaving the club with dead air. In the European discotheques, DJs used two turntables making the music seamless and their selections were amazing—a mix of American rock and roll, and moody, atmospheric, European music. The juxtaposition was intoxicating in and of itself. When discotheques finally started to open in New York City in the mid-1960s and DJs followed the same format as Europe, young Manhattanites were enthralled, and I took note of how the DJ controlled the crowd.
In 1968, I acquired an interest in the Executive Hotel on Thirty-Seventh Street and Madison Avenue in Manhattan for $10,000. It was in receivership and I figured I could turn it around with a vision for an unusual restaurant/club to market the property. I developed my plans for the hotel’s basement bar and restaurant. It was once known as “The Den at the Duane,” where up-and-coming singers like Barbra Streisand had performed many years earlier. My concept was an intimate lounge with a piano bar, designed for couples where every table was enclosed with glittering strings of beads for privacy. I called it “A Quiet Little Table in the Corner.” We advertised using headlines such as “Corner Her Tonight,” and “After Our 4 Romantic Corner Tables Are Taken We Have 19 More.” Something told me “word of mouth” marketing and promotion would build business quickly, so we invited all the residents from the neighborhood to come in for a free cocktail and hors d’oeuvres. “A Quiet Little Table in the Corner” became an overnight success.
Ultimately, the unusual name drew crowds, although not everyone agreed in the beginning. When I first floated the name by my publicist Dick Auletta, he said, “My God, that name is a press agent’s nightmare!”
I shook my head incredulously and asked him what he was talking about.
“There are too many words in that name,” he explained. “Gossip columnists always have to worry about how many words they have space for in their columns. I guarantee you, Mark, they’ll be hesitant to say, ‘Richard Burton and Liz Taylor were spotted at A Quiet Little Table in the Corner.’ You should call it something else.”
“I don’t think so, Dick,” I objected. “The name itself will attract people’s attention. Besides, I don’t see this as a celebrity hangout for Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.”
I saw A Quiet Little Table in the Corner as a place that would cater exclusively to the New York dating scene. It was the Swingin’ 1960s—the era of the sexual revolution. The Dating Game and Love, American Style were among the most popular shows on television. What better time to develop a restaurant especially for couples out on dates? We served tapas that would be cooked over a Hibachi with tasty dips. If a couple out on their first date didn’t have a lot to say to one another, this gave them something to do, thus avoiding that awkward and embarrassing silence that could occur. There was also live music from the piano bar, setting the tone for romance.
A Quiet Little Table in the Corner wasn’t just a hit—it remained a New York dating hot spot for the next fifteen years. The success spilled over into the hotel itself. At the end of the night, it wasn’t unusual for busboys to find panties under the tables as they were cleaning up the booths. One would imagine that, on more than one occasion, a couple who began their evening at the Quiet Table, as it was referred to, continued it upstairs in one of the rooms of the Executive Hotel.
The pill was made available in the early 1960s, but it wasn’t until the mid—to late 1960s that large numbers of women started to use it. When that happened, things really got loose. Once girls knew they could screw around with little consequence, it was game on. Women were ready and eager to experiment with this newfound freedom and they often became the aggressors. It was great timing for Quiet Table and for me. I was up for almost anything.
Soon after we opened, my publicist set up an interview with Carol, a reporter for a major restaurant industry magazine. As the owner of a Manhattan supper club, I had gained some currency with the opposite sex, and I could tell right away upon meeting Carol that she was attracted to me. Though we had our interview during the day, it didn’t make sense for Carol to write a piece about A Quiet Little Table in the Corner and not
experience it at night. Plus, I had high hopes that our flirtation might continue into the nighttime hours, so we made an appointment to meet that evening. When Carol showed up, I was confused to see she had brought along her friend Bonnie.
“We’re here to do an interview about A Quiet Little Table, so why don’t we go experience one?” I suggested. The girls agreed. All of the booths were surrounded by beads, so you could see the outlines of people sitting at the tables but not what they were doing—and if someone wanted service, there was a gold tassel to pull, which turned on a small red light signaling to the slender, slinky waitresses in black tights to take a drink order. But otherwise the tables were very private, which was what A Quiet Little Table in the Corner was all about.
The three of us slid into a booth—with me in the middle—and continued our evening. Our bartender Buster always gave me and my guests doubles of whatever we ordered. He and I had concocted a Trader Vic’s–like drink with vodka and fruit juices—the kind of cocktail where you couldn’t taste the alcohol, but you knew you were drinking something strong. Bonnie and Carol were drinking the specials, while I was drinking Dewar’s on the rocks, and we were getting drunker and drunker as the night wore on. Carol started rubbing my leg, letting her hand drift to the inside of my thigh, a real turn on. Perhaps, if I played the evening right, the three of us could end up together. A ménage à trois was something I had imagined but had certainly never experienced myself, but within seconds of telling the girls I kept a room for myself in the Executive Hotel just above the restaurant, the three of us were in the elevator heading upstairs.
Within a few moments it became a frenzied tangle of limbs. We were all hands and mouths on skin in a scene so unimaginable to me only a few hours earlier. I’d have thought it fictional had I not lived it. Looking back, I’m guessing that Carol really wanted to have sex with Bonnie but it took me to set the scene and make it happen. This was my first ménage à trois, and once I had opened this Pandora’s Box, I was hooked. That night was the first of a series of increasingly common sexual forays that, with the addition of the recreational drugs of the day, made settling down with one woman a less and less likely scenario.
Inside Studio 54 Page 5
